Film

Waves

Name: Waves
Genre: Romance, Drama
Released: 2019
Cast: Kelvin Harrison Jr., Taylor Russell, Renée Elise Goldsberry, Sterling K. Brown, Lucas Hedges

Family drama

Waves is a staggering family drama that splits itself in two: first a taut thriller about a controlling father and his gifted son's catastrophic fall, then a tender portrait of a daughter learning to live after unthinkable loss. It's visually audacious, emotionally wracking, and moves like nothing else. For people who want cinema that breaks you open.

TMDb rating

3.7

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you want a slow-burn family drama driven by a restless, almost feverish camera and performances that let big emotions spill over, with a love story that arrives gently in its second half.

Skip it if you find relentless emotional pressure wearing rather than moving, and at nearly two and a half hours the stylistic restlessness can feel like a lot to sit through.

What it asks of you: Expect a long run of close, nervous attention, with the volume high for much of the running time and little room to breathe between scenes.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

If you liked this

Manchester by the Sea2016

A devastated man returns to his hometown and must confront both his past and his responsibility for his nephew. Like Waves, it's about grief that rewires a family and performances that communicate through silence and gesture.

But The mood is relentlessly bleak and the plot moves slowly. If you need catharsis or a clear emotional trajectory, this will frustrate you.

Moonlight2016

Three chapters of a Black man's life, each a small act of grace. Both films use visual poetry and specificity to explore identity, vulnerability, and what family means when blood isn't enough. Devastating and tender in equal measure.

But Nothing you'd call plot happens. It's impressionistic and requires patience with ambiguity and spaces between words.

The Last Black Man in San Francisco2019

A young man tries to reclaim his family home and dignity in a changing city. Shares Waves' visual ambition, its deep focus on Black family life, and its refusal to make suffering easy or obvious.

But Slow, poetic cinema. The narrative priorities are mood and image over plot momentum. Not for viewers who want clarity.

The Last Black Man in San Francisco poster

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Waves

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

The Farewell2019

Both are formal films made by and about specific communities of color that understand family drama as architecture—how we're built, where the cracks are, what we can still build despite them.

A Chinese-American family gathers under a pretense, and the film explores belonging, translation, and what we owe family across cultures. Like Waves, it's visually playful while examining how family binds us, and it finds humor in pain without dismissing either.

But It refuses to let you settle into one emotional register. The tonal shifts may feel jarring if you're expecting a single story.

Hereditary2018

A family unravels after a death, with tensions that were always there suddenly exposed. Both films understand how trauma reshapes family bonds and use visual language to convey horror that dialogue cannot.

But This is a horror film in ways that may genuinely disturb you. Its ending is ambiguous and offers no comfort.

Minari2021

A Korean-American family chases the American dream and discovers what they actually want. Like Waves, it's intimate and specific about immigrant and minority family dynamics, with a father whose ambitions damage his children.

But The pacing is deliberate and quiet. There's no villain to blame, which makes it harder to process the damage that unfolds.

If Beale Street Could Talk2018

Two young Black lovers face an unjust system. Shares Waves' visual sophistication and its conviction that Black joy and Black pain both deserve cinema's most beautiful language.

But It's structured around a central injustice that is never resolved. The film asks you to sit with rage rather than release it.

Eighth Grade2018

A girl navigates her final year of middle school. Both films observe adolescent life with unusual tenderness and understand that small moments—a conversation, a glance—can reshape someone's sense of self.

But Painfully awkward in places. If you're uncomfortable watching young people suffer social embarrassment, this will test you.

Uncut Gems2019

A man's poor choices cascade into catastrophe, trapping his family. Both films feature controlling fathers whose damage radiates outward, and both use restless visual style to mirror internal chaos.

But Relentlessly tense and exhausting. It doesn't pause to let you breathe and the ending satisfies neither the head nor the heart.

Chloe2010

A young woman's life fractures after a betrayal she half-caused. Explores the aftermath of emotional ruin with quiet sophistication and belief that cinema can track invisible damage.

But Slow, glacial, with a deliberately muted color palette. If you need warmth or resolution, this will feel empty.

The Florida Project2017

Both films trust the visual world to do the storytelling and both understand that children see clearly what adults rationalize. Both end with a child facing a future that has no easy answers.

A child's wonder sustains her through poverty in a decaying motel. Where Waves asks what happens when the world breaks you, this asks how people survive when survival itself requires daily miracles. It's visually euphoric and morally devastating.

But The handheld camera work is relentless and the ending refuses to resolve anything. It can feel exploitative if you're cynical about poverty as subject matter.

A Ghost Story2017

Both use formal visual constraint to explore enormous emotional ideas. Both understand that cinema can access grief that dialogue cannot, and that holding a moment longer than feels comfortable is how you break someone open.

A man dies and returns as a ghost bound to a house, watching time erode everything he knew. Like Waves, it's a meditation on how we persist in memory and how love transforms us even when we can't be reached. Deceptively simple, genuinely haunting.

But There's a scene of someone sitting in a sheet for twenty minutes. The tone is dreamlike and existential in ways that can read as inert rather than profound.